For a laptop to make a statement, it needs to have more than just the latest components—it has to have style. Lenovo’s Yoga 9i is ready to compete in today’s market with its Intel 12th Gen P-series CPUs, but it shows it’s more than just another thin-and-light convertible with luxurious details.

You can immediately tell the Yoga 9i was designed to grab your attention with its shiny, polished finishes. But it’s the creature comforts, like a hi-res webcam with background blur, an optional tall and fast OLED touchscreen, and abnormally loud speakers—that tell the real story.

(Note: The OLED versions of the Yoga 9i aren’t available for purchase, but Lenovo told us they should be available at Best Buy within the next two weeks.)

Slim and shiny

The Yoga 9i proves that a laptop doesn’t have to be a MacBook or even a MacBook imitator to offer a striking design. The aluminum chassis on my test unit is silver, but the laptop also comes in a gold-like “oatmeal” shade and a darker gray. I enjoyed the subtle sparkles on the silver version’s matte lid, deck, and keyboard. Rather than begging for attention by living in the center of the laptop’s lid, the carved Lenovo and Yoga logos play it cool and wait for you to notice them on the lid’s edges.

You might call this laptop’s design “edgy”—not because it’s rebellious, but because of the deck’s striking, shiny edges. Reflective and polished, they offer a rounded alternative to the sharp, pointy laptop edges we often see. Lenovo says the edges make the machine more comfortable to hold when in tablet mode, but I found they added unnecessary slipperiness.

More cumbersome is the slim, flat power button on the right side of the deck; I repeatedly hit it accidentally when moving the laptop, even after a few weeks of using the machine. The Yoga 9i’s polished edges are pretty, but I’d prefer boring, unreflective, sharp edges if it meant I could have a better grip and fewer accidental power button presses.

If you rarely hold your laptop on the left and right sides, you probably won’t be bothered. There’s no power button on the spine, of course.

There’s also a soundbar. The holes covering the 360-degree hinge and its two tweeters are the final details that turn the laptop into a statement piece. Still, I worry about the speakers’ longevity, especially considering the fact that the holes are exposed, even when the laptop is closed.

Finally, the Yoga 9i doesn’t let slimness ruin port selection. On the left, it has two Thunderbolt 4 ports and even a USB-A port (3.2 Gen 2 at 10 Gbps). The right side has a 3.5 mm jack and another USB-C port (3.2 Gen 2).

There’s no HDMI or DisplayPort, but between the Thunderbolt 4 options for a USB-C monitor and the OLED screen, you’ll hopefully be able to make do.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1845280